Price Increase For Tortillas Is Illegal, Mexico Declares

IMPACTO! - News and information for and about the hispanic community - CARIBBEAN AND LATIN AMERICA

January 23, 2000

MEXICO CITY - Plans by a group of tortilla producers to raise the price of the Mexican dietary staple by more than 14 percent have been declared illegal by the government, which says it might file price-fixing charges against the producers.

Mexicans were outraged last week when the Corn-Tortilla Chain Club, a group of 15 million producers of corn and tortillas, said it would boost the price of tortillas from the equivalent of 17 to 20 U.S. cents a pound in Mexico City. Outside the capital, it said it would raise prices even higher.

In a statement, six Cabinet members and the governor of the Bank of Mexico said the price increase might violate federal regulations prohibiting monopolies. Officials of the producers group had claimed the cost of making tortillas had risen above the selling price.